


Remedy

by brynnmck



Category: Battlestar Galactica (2003)
Genre: Angst, F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2005-07-11
Updated: 2005-07-11
Packaged: 2017-12-14 06:37:13
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,228
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/833859
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/brynnmck/pseuds/brynnmck
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>There are some remedies worse than the disease.  Angsty reunion smut.  Or smutty reunion angst, whichever.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Remedy

_There are some remedies worse than the disease.  
\- Publilius Syrus_

Kara makes her way to the infirmary, limping, trailed by an armed marine, and everything feels slow and sticky around her. She’d known that coming back would be bad, but nothing had prepared her for this, the thinly-veiled panic and vicious pleasure on Tigh’s face when he told her about the Old Man. She’s been cleaned up and interrogated, debriefed and inoculated and then thrown in the brig; she hasn’t seen Helo and… whoever-she-is since they all returned, silent and wary in a battered Raptor. She’s not sure what they did with the Arrow—Roslin was in the cell next to her in the brig, so she obviously won’t be using it, and Kara had burst into hysterical laughter at the sight of her. Now she’s been allowed an hour to sit with the Old Man, and though on the surface it’s a privilege, she knows it’s meant as punishment.

She’ll take it.

The curtains are drawn around the bed. When she pulls one back, hardly daring to look, for a second all she can see is his face, gray and ashen and “the Old Man” has always been an affectionate nickname, but now she realizes it’s true. Her heart contracts sharp and hard in her chest; her eyes burn. She curls her hands into fists and curses her short fingernails that won’t draw blood. When she’s blinked enough to be able to see, she realizes that Lee is sitting next to the bed, holding his father’s hand, his head bowed. The set of his shoulders is enough to send her vision blurry again.

She turns to the marine guard, says quietly, “You wanna get a cup of coffee or something?” The last time she saw him, she won a razor from him that she promptly lost to Dee, and he looks at her for a second, then nods and steps out of the room. Maybe he’s a Cylon. Maybe she is, and the worst thing about that thought is that she could live forever.

When she turns back, Lee’s eyes are on her, and it hits her harder than that blonde bitch she’d wasted back on Caprica. She’s seen grief and despair both in him before, but nothing like this; he looks fierce and hollow and desperate, both more and less the Lee she’s always known.

He doesn’t say anything, just carefully lays his father’s hand down on the cot, then stands, grabs hold of her arm, and drags her into the corridor. Her stiff, bruised muscles protest, but she stumbles after him. The whole ship is eerily silent and empty; the air is thick with fear and suspicion. She thinks that, on top of everything else, she’s lost _Galactica_ , too.

Lee veers into an empty room, pulls her in, jams the hatch closed with a clank. He just looks at her, dark and implacable, and for a second, she’s sure he’s going to hit her. She wishes he would. Then he steps toward her, shoves her against the wall, and without a word, crushes her mouth against his.

She’s still wrecked from her fight with the Cylon, and his mouth and his hands spark fresh pains where he touches her, but that makes it all right—wide eyes and shy, heated smiles send her running, but she can give him this, the faint tang of blood on her tongue as one of the cuts on her mouth reopens. He pulls back almost immediately, his breath ragged, ghosts his mouth over the sickly rainbow of marks on her face, but his fist is tight in her hair and his fingers are pinching her nipple, hard, and the contrast sends her reeling. Her knees buckle; his hand slips from her hair and grabs the back of her collar instead, holding her up. He sets his teeth against her neck and she slams her head back into the wall deliberately, bites her bottom lip.

Then his hand is at her waist, his fingers hooked around the elastic of her sweatpants and her underwear. He yanks down, the back of his hand trailing against the bare skin of her abdomen and her leg; she shivers and pulls one leg free while he shoves aside his own clothing. He’s hard and ready and his eyes are hot on hers as she braces her hands on the iron tension of his shoulders, lets him hoist her up against the wall.

When he drives into her, she can’t tell whether she’s saved or damned.

It’s hard to care, though, because after a stunned, silent second he starts thrusting against her, his hips slamming her against the cold wall and his fingers digging into her hamstrings. Each jolt seems to drive away a layer of the fog that’s protected her since she broke and sobbed in Helo’s arms on Caprica, stripping her until she’s raw and open, tears tracing slowly down her bruised cheeks. Lee lifts his head and kisses her hard, teeth and tongue, fury and fear and—she’s always known it—love. She can’t breathe, can’t stop. She slides her hand between them, and almost the instant she touches herself she starts to shake, feels herself drowning. She surfaces just in time to feel him drive deep into her and then stop, tense and shuddering, pouring into her, gasping into the crook of her shoulder and neck.

For a long moment, all the tension drains from his body, and he slumps against her, his weight keeping her pinned against the wall. Her breathing is loud in the small room; she’s still quaking with the aftershocks. She can feel hot moisture where his face is pressed against her skin, and before she can think about it, she reaches up a hand, smoothes the ragged ends of his hair against the back of his sweat-damp neck.

The movement seems to bring him back. His chest rises and falls against hers, just once, before he pulls out of her, and she has to bite her lip again. He releases her legs and lets her get her feet underneath her, then steps back, strips off one of his shirts and dutifully cleans both of them up, tosses the dirty shirt into a corner when he’s finished. His hands are gentle as he pulls her sweats and underwear back into place, but he won’t look at her, and worse than that, he’s still not saying anything, and Lee has words for everything.

So does she, usually, but when he finally meets her eyes, his expression is cold and haunted. Her apologies die in her throat. Of course; she killed his brother and now she may have killed his father, too—of course he can’t forgive her just because they’ve frakked against a wall, or because she’s desperately, uselessly sorry. Besides, he’s heard her apologies a thousand times before. When he turns and leaves the room, the hatch hanging open behind him, she just stands there for a minute, hamstrung.

But the marine will be back from his cup of coffee soon—he could be back already, but her luck always holds in these insignificant things, so she doubts it—and she doesn’t want to raise suspicion. So she takes a deep breath and walks slowly back to the infirmary.

After all, she’s got nowhere else to go.


End file.
